s the serving cabinet secretary and head of the civil service, and, at the start of the Iraq war, principal private secretary to Tony Blair, Sir Jeremy Heywood was at pains to reassure the public administration select committee of his total commitment to transparency. Albeit a transparency that verged on opacity.

How did he feel about the delays to the Chilcot inquiry, asked Labour’s Paul Flynn. “Deeply frustrated,” Heywood replied, resisting his natural impulse to point out that delaying inconvenient reports was a sign of a job well done.

Would there be an audit trail of his interventions?

“Definitely not,” said Heywood, crossing his fingers.

Redactions in the transcripts of phone calls between Tony Blair and George W Bush? A few spelling mistakes had had to be taken out.

Did he know anyone who was in the process of Maxwellisation (which gives individuals an opportunity to respond to provisional criticism in the inquiry’s report)?

“Absolutely not,” he insisted, before inadvertently letting on that two people had told him they were being Maxwellised. That kind of careless talk costs lives.

Having confirmed he had done nothing in regard to Chilcot, Heywood next confirmed that he hadn’t given a moment’s thought to which party or parties might form the next government, though he was sure that whoever it was would do exactly what he said. Heywood knows exactly who runs the country: he does.

What’s more, Heywood knew exactly the type of talent he was looking to work under him. “I have a talent matrix to measure talent,” he announced.

Bemusement turned to outright amazement when he went on to add that “functional leaders manage functions”.

Conservative Cheryl Gillan asked what leadership skills he was looking for in the civil service. Heywood said he was setting up an inquiry into that and hoped to report back in five or six years. Or possibly later, if things went well.

Lib Dem Greg Mulholland was concerned about reports that the civil service was now full of “horizon scanners” and “stove-pipers”. What did these people do?

Heywood was outraged. There were absolutely no stove-pipers, and if there were they were only a very small team – a specialist cell – and “they were getting ahead of the in-tray”.

As for the horizon scanners, they were looking between the cracks.

Labour’s Paul Flynn couldn’t resist going for the kill.

“Had the horizon scanners investigated drones?” he said, as straight-faced as possible. Heywood didn’t get the joke.

“No they hadn’t,” he snapped. “But if the drones did need investigating then our horizon scanners will be on to them.”

The limitations of the horizon scanners became all too clear when chairman Bernard Jenkin ambushed Heywood, accusing him of having failed to interpret the civil service code of conduct correctly by allowing the prime minister to pressurise him into condoning the involvement of special advisers in party political campaigning.

It got worse. While Heywood had been ducking and diving, his own spad had been rummaging through some files and placed the relevant page of the code under his nose. Heywood gave him a death stare. Here was one civil servant whose immediate horizon looked bleak.

“My conscience is clear,” insisted Heywood, not looking at the document. The clarity of conscience that comes of a lifetime in the shadows.